Mark "Frosty" Winterbottom starts Bathurst 1000 from pole position after clocking the fastest time in shoot-out for the top 10 grid positions.

Frosty qualifies for pole, eyes podium

FORD Performance Racing driver Mark ''Frosty'' Winterbottom will start today's Bathurst 1000 from pole position after clocking the fastest time in yesterday's shoot-out for the top 10 grid positions.

After qualifying fourth fastest on Friday the 29-year-old from Melbourne won his second start from P1 at Mount Panorama and his fourth start from the front row of the grid. It will also be his 15th career start from pole position in V8 Supercars.

TeamVodafone's Craig Lowndes posted the second fastest shoot-out time and his Triple Eight Commodore will start alongside Winterbottom on the front row. Lowndes and co-driver Mark Skaife declined to say last night who would start today's 161-lap race in the car.

Defending V8 Supercars champion Jamie Whincup will start from the second row in third spot on the grid and Fujitsu Racing/GRM driver Lee Holdsworth will start from fourth spot after a strong performance in the shoot-out.

Winterbottom's No. 5 blue Orrcon Steel Falcon was one of three Ford cars in the shoot-out and he felt ''a bit riding on our shoulders'' with seven Holden drivers, including top qualifier Jason Bright, battling for pole position.

After warm weather greeted drivers for the morning practice session the temperature dropped and clouds rolled in, which made it harder for teams to pick the ideal car set-up for the track conditions.

''It's hard in that one lap to get tyre temperature up and committing to the top of the mountain with cold tyres is pretty tough,'' Winterbottom said. ''You can never do the perfect lap here and Craig was obviously the danger man [in the third and final sector], he's been quick all weekend.''

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Lowndes was the second-last driver on track for the shoot-out and despite a good final sector down Conrod Straight and into the final turn he fell eight-tenths of a second short of Winterbottom's two minutes, 07.5377 seconds.

''We made some adjustments, but our first sector was probably our weakest, our middle sector across the top was OK and in our last sector the car started to come on song,'' Lowndes said.

Whincup said his No. 1 TeamVodafone Commodore was handling well after needing repairs to the front suspension on Friday.

''Clearly Frosty and Lowndsey hung it on the line a bit harder and they deserve pole,'' the three-time Bathurst winner said.

Bright slipped from being Friday's quickest qualifier to eighth spot on the grid with Castrol Edge Racing's Greg Murphy and The Bottle-O Racing Team's Paul Dumbrell occupying the two spots behind him.

Defending Bathurst champions Garth Tander and Will Davison will start from fifth and sixth on the grid respectively and series leader James Courtney will chase his maiden Bathurst win from seventh spot.

Winterbottom, who has seven starts at the track for three finishes, has never been on the podium.

After deciding to ''have a crack'' at pole position he's now aiming to make up for some of the disappointments of recent years. ''We really want to finish off some of the work we've done here…a podium would be nice,'' he said.

Holdsworth, who was third in last year's race, clocked the fastest time in the morning practice ahead of Lowndes and Whincup.